Sub Rosa In Æternum, the thrilling sixth studio full-length from Sweden’s Tribulation, encapsulates a freshly inspired approach to the quartet’s blackened, gothic style of heavy music. Once again, Tribulation has succeeded in channeling their collective fascination for examining different religions, esoteric traditions, myths, horror, and other occult findings, into an unearthly force of darkly rousing, chilling compositions.

Authoritative and authentic in its own right, Sub Rosa In Æternum reveals a glaring distinction from the band’s works prior within moments of the first track: Vocalist/bassist Johannes Andersson’s deep, clean vocal expression. While the band has showcased this minimally in the past, it has never truly felt right. This characteristic highlights an evolution of the band’s sound that Tribulation guitarist, Adam Zaars, acknowledges as something that’s really opened new doors for the band, creatively.

“Johannes demoed a song - the last song on the new album, ‘Poison Pages,’ with him singing. It was a surprise to all of us,” Zaars shares. “We liked the song and the idea, and after listening to it many times, we saw the potential in his voice. From then on, we started trying it out on some of the material we already had written, which didn’t always fit together. But a song like ‘Hungry Waters,’ a song like ‘Murder In Red,’ ‘Reaping Song;’ all of those songs couldn’t have happened if we hadn’t decided to go with the clean style of vocals.”

He continues, “That aspect absolutely changed the possibilities of what we could even do, musically, which was terrifying and liberating at the same time.”

Both transfixing and haunting, Andersson’s vocal shift - with his ghoulish-like screams still active in the music - transformed the entire songwriting experience for everyone involved. Opportunities arose for Zaars and the band to utilize different layers of melodies and other melancholic details that complimented the newer vocal style.

“I rarely write stuff when I have my guitar,” Zaars states. “It’s mostly melodies from when I’m taking a walk and I get something stuck in my head. And then you have to translate that and find ways to make it work. Sometimes what’s needed might be a piano, or some sort of synthesizer. On Sub Rosa, we experimented so much with the sound on each song, and since we also have the clean vocals, that changed the way we wrote the music.”

As the vision for Sub Rosa in Æternum was gradually coming together, Zaars’ song “Saturn Coming Down” helped establish more of a direction. Another one, later, would be “Hungry Waters,” written by new Tribulation guitarist, Joseph Tholl.

“At first, Joseph wrote ‘Hungry Waters,’ and when he showed it to me the first time, I absolutely loved it. But I also thought, ‘we can’t be screaming over this.’ I didn’t think it would fit,” Zaars explains. “But once we had embraced the idea of clean singing more, that song became a stepping stone into how far we could take it. That continued to culminate with my song ‘Murder In Red,’ because it has so many elements that we’ve never really done before - not to that extent. The electronic drums, the Chris Isaak kind of vibe on the vocals. We even have an opera singer in the background, and bits in there inspired by Italian horror films - very classic Italian horror-inspired. These songs definitely helped set the tone for the entire album for me.”

The collaboration between guitarist Tholl and Zaars proved to be a beneficial balance for the making of this record. Zaars describes his own writing style as more adventurous and free-form; or “chaotic,” as he puts it. While he explains that Tholl comes from more of a pop/rock background where his writing is much more structured.

“Looking back at Formulas Of Death, I wrote most of it, and we wanted the music to be as free as possible. When I started a song, I had whatever idea - a riff, or an intro, or a mid-section, or whatever, and I just let it take me wherever it took me. That’s why it’s so strange, long and diverse.”

He continues, “Looking at Sub Rosa, I still have that initial instinct when I start writing a song…The difference between what we did before this album and what we’re doing now, is that we have Joseph on guitar. This is his first album with us, and he’s a songwriter who wrote four of the new songs. He comes from a completely different direction. He has been writing pop and rock songs, a lot more structured songs…Looking at the songs I wrote on this album - every time I start a song, I still have that idea of not knowing where it’s gonna go. Joseph is able to come in and help me structure. I think it’s still good that I write like that, because it creates something diverse…but we’re able to take in a little bit from each other.”